Tory leader urges Blair to halt amnesty

UK Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith has urged Tony Blair to halt the proposed amnesty for Northern Irish terrorists on the run.

In a letter to the British Prime Minister, Duncan Smith said that concessions to parties which had not fulfilled their obligations were generating ‘‘a sense of injustice, betrayal and cynicism’’ in the province.

He called on Mr Blair to declare whether he believed that the ceasefires of Irish paramilitary groups were ‘‘complete and unequivocal’’, as he said they should be at the time of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

And he asked whether Mr Blair believed the IRA should now disband and all illegally-held weapons should be decommissioned by May 2003 - five years after the agreement.

Mr Blair and Taoiseach Bertie Ahern are due to hold talks with all the pro-Agreement parties at Hillsborough, Co Down, on Thursday in a bid to avert a full-blown crisis in the peace process.

Mr Duncan Smith said he hoped the meeting would contribute towards ending the ‘‘current drift’’ in the process and bring about the full implementation of the agreement.

He wrote: ‘‘Ahead of this meeting, I would be grateful if you could clarify a number of points. The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, recently made clear his belief that the decommissioning of all illegally-held weapons should be completed by May 2003 and that the IRA must be disbanded. Do you agree with him?

‘‘Is it your current view that the ceasefires are ‘complete and unequivocal’ as set against the tests you outlined in May 1998, tests that you said would become ‘more rigorous over time’?’’

In April, Mr Ahern told the Dáil he expected all IRA weapons and explosives to be put beyond use by the time of the Northern Ireland Assembly elections in 2003, but could see no prospect of the same occurring with loyalist weapons.

Following his re-election last month, he said that the IRA would have to disband for Sinn Fein to have any hope of serving in ministries in Dublin.

Mr Duncan Smith called on Mr Blair not to proceed with the proposed amnesty for on-the-run terrorists or the disbandment of the Full Time Police Reserve.